. the white house issued a statement last night saying thattheobamaadministrationwasin close contact with the algerian government, but still trying to, "gain a fuller understanding of what exactly happened there and what the situation is now." that's really where it stands. still trying to determine from the algerians what transpired. they cracked down on these terrorists very quickly. the loss of the hostages' lives. but this is something that the algerians clearly wanted something to make clear. they were going to handle themselves and they handled it as they saw fit. randi? >> but they're certainly getting a lot of criticism coming out yesterday for trying to launch this attack to try to end it. what are the rest of the world and the leaders saying about this assault and how it all went down? >> that is exactly the question. publicly they are saying that absolutely the violence was the result of the attack by this group of militants, but right now what this poses for intelligence services around the world and especially for the u.s. is a very crucial question. al qaeda in north af

he might ortheobamaadministrationmightcarry that out in a place like algeria where that government and their military forces are making it clear they don't want outside help, might be pretty hard for the u.s. to live up to that promise at least for the moment. ashleigh? >> well, you know, barbara, we're four month from september 11th, we're in next door libya we still don't have an arrest of said terrorists who dared to do what they did to us, kill our ambassador and take out others who were serving in the mission there, so i love that tough talk. but, please, really, can we? >> yeah. no, i think you have actually just hit on it. everyone is now very anxious to say that north africa, mali, algeria, tunisia, libya, egypt, all of this is the new front for al qaeda, safe havens, the war on terror. a lot of words being thrown around, ashleigh, but action on the ground, being able to put military force into there and hunt down these north african al qaeda leaders and the cells of al qaeda, that's another thing. a lot of these countries are not anxious for outside force,